The Most Important Cause of European Imperial Expansion in the 19th Century - Term Paper Example

The cause of European imperial expansion in the 19th century has many factors. The most important ones involve culture and science. There is no better illustration of this than the power and growth of the Royal Geographic Society of Britain. This organization showcased these qualities and was at the forefront of European imperial expansion. The famous Royal Geographical Society began its existence as a dining club in London in the early 19th century. It rapidly gained influence and in the mid-19th century was granted a royal charter from Queen Victoria. It sponsored many famous explorers and expeditions over the next hundred years and became quite prominent. It was created at an opportune time for British imperialists. The world was opening up, explorers were gaining ground, and the British crown was claiming more and more land. Not only did this new territory have to be mapped and surveyed and its inhabitants interviewed and learned about, but the new borders to be imposed would have to help Britain maintain and defend this new territory. An organization that could do all of this would be an organization that would and could become increasingly powerful. While some of the work done by the RGS was in good faith and showed a high level of accuracy and ability, much of it was politically influenced and done at the service of political and business interests that were more concerned with profit than geography. Indeed, when a person looks at a map of the globe today and the borders of countries in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa, one often wonders, “Why a border there? There is no physical or ethnic reason for it to exist there . . .” Many of these borders actually fly in the face of any practical consideration and were created solely for the benefit of others. As such they continue to this day to create conflict and strife around the world. The RGS contributed to the British imperial ethos of the day. By the mid-19th century lots of places in the world, considered for many years as terra incognito were opening up for the first time. Explorers such as Stanley and Livingstone were for the first time making inroads into the interior of Africa. British citizens were present in India and had substantial roles in the various courts there. Britain had significant interests in the Middle East. Britain’s economy, more than ever before was linked to the world’s. Britain relied on its colonies and the new lands being discovered for a great deal of its wealth—and as such it wanted to keep control not only of these colonies and lands but of trade links that led to them. There were constant threats. Threats came not only from restless natives who were very resentful of being dominated by British soldiers and bureaucrats, but also from imperial rivals such as France and Germany. Everyone was trying to carve out a portion of the new land and to create various spheres of influence over which they would have dominion. Things were very competitive. And this is where the Royal Geographical Society came in and to some extent gave Britain a competitive advantage. Indeed, there was a lot at stake in these first encounters. The first explorers of the Orient brought to the West the first stories and images of the people of the East. In that respect they are responsible for setting the tone of the relationship between the two cultures. These first early images seemed in some way, the critic Edward W. Said has argued, to occasion what came after them—political and administrative control of the East as a vast colony.1 No effort was made to understand the cultural divide between East and West; this lack of understanding led Westerners to believe their own way of life was simply better and should be taught to Easterners. In the beginning, organizations like the Royal Geographical Society were purely scientific and academic organizations. That perfectly fit the principles of the political and business figures who wanted to hire explorers to claim land and resources, but who wanted to put a neutral, scientific sheen upon these expeditions. Essentially such individuals wanted to dress up their land grabs as scientific adventures. As one critic writes of such geographical and scientific societies (in a stinging rebuke to them and their kind): Initially, these new kinds of travellers were often sponsored by trading companies or were attached to government expeditions. But they rapidly developed independent scientific and religious institutions to support their work, such as The Royal Geographical Society or the various Missionary Societies, a development that allowed them ostensibly to distance themselves from commercial and military expeditions and to portray themselves as harmless knowledge seekers in contrast to rapacious traders and expeditionary forces of conquest.2 As newspaper owners and other media giants began to see how much money expeditions such as Henry Stanley’s was generating in ad revenue and paper sales, they too wanted a piece. Such expeditions became very profitable and contributed to the creation of an imperialistic ethos that soon helped the British Empire spread around the world. The Royal Geographical Society found this model very beneficial. They benefited hugely from playing a role “advising the prince,” so to speak. They were able to do the mapping, but they were also often asked for advice on matters relating to politics and the military. Once again without taking on a publicly political role, they were able to working the background shaping and deciding things of great consequence to people very far away. We should not overlook the maps that were made. It is to a large part the making of these maps, the creation of these geographies that helped implement the imperial project underway by Britain. The projects researched and completed by these geographers were done at the service of imperialism. As one author writes, the themes in the works include: The links between empire and antiquity, race and racism, and environmentalism . . . One of the important features of these historical geographies is the way in which they demonstrate a particular view of geography, seen as a background to history and as a scientific and humanistic justification for a range of imperial ideals and policies . . .3 This always underlined the activities of the Royal Geographical Society. And nowhere so much as in the Middle East, which Britain had long coveted and which became increasingly under its control in the late 19th century and early 20th century up until World War Two. These geographers, members of the Royal Geographers Society, mapped out the world and the strategy in which Britain would engage that new world. They contributed to and, in some ways, shaped the imperial ethos that dominated the lives of so many millions of people for so many years. References Ashcroft, Bill, et al. Post-Colonial Studies. New York: Routledge, 2000. Bell, Morag, and Robin Alan Butlin, M. J. Heffernan. Geography and Imperialism, 1820-1940. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1995. RGS. Explorations: Great Moments of Discovery from the Royal Geographical Society. London: Artisan, 2002 Kaplan, Robert D. “The Revenge of Geography.” Foreign Policy. May/June 2009. http://www.foreignpolicy.com/story/cms.php?story_id=4862&print=1 Pitts, Jennifer. A Turn to Empire, the Rise of Imperial Liberalism in Britain and France, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2006. Tocqueville, Alexis de. Writings on Empire and Slavery, edited and translated by Jennifer Pitts. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2001. A. G. Hopkins, “Back to the Future: from National History to Imperial History”, Past and Present No. 164 (August 1999) pp. 198-243 Conklin, Alice. “Introduction: Writing Colonial Histories” French Historical Studies 27 no. 3 (Summer 2004) pp. 497-505. Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York: Vintage, 1979 Read More